


time waster

by burnsides



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Card Games, F/F, Falling In Love, IPRE, M/M, lupcretia is mentioned just bc i love it, passing the time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-07-13
Packaged: 2018-12-01 12:55:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11486832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burnsides/pseuds/burnsides
Summary: Merle glances up at him and smiles, and Davenport feels his brain shut down."Your move, Cap'n," Merle says. It's so easy to relax around him. Terrifyingly so.





	time waster

**Author's Note:**

> if i say anything wrong just tell me, as always!  
> im a fan of davenchurch. two dads and just a dusting of lupcretia

Merle touched his beard when he was thinking. It was his tell; poker was easy with the dwarf, because he'd tap his lips and hum with each of his plays (and also because he would cackle with each win. Loudly. And slam his hands down and sigh confidently). He was touching his beard, right then - he was letting it curl around his lips and fingertips, squinting in the fading sunset light of the big window behind them.

Davenport played chess with him because he knew Merle would be thinking a lot. It made him feel selfish, to think about it-him taking time and energy away from the mission for these little endeavors-but it gave him an excuse to stare at him. His worn skin, smile lines around his forehead and eyes, curved around his lips. The white of his hair almost silver against the orange-red light outside, and they're tinted against his green glasses. He looks like how people describe old gods, he thinks, and feels ashamed for thinking it. As if he had a right to stare.

He sighs softly, tapping his lips against his chin. It had been a long day-Magnus and Taako finally teamed up and dragged Lucretia out of her quarters, much to her protests, and gotten her outside. The planet they were on had an environment spectacularly different from theirs; a large moon that was constant even in the daytime, plants and foliage as large as their heads, people with gestures needed to accompany their language. Lup had taken the time to show her the different styles and fashions that were there, wrapping soft scarves carefully around her head and cooing as Lucretia turned a dark red. The combination of the twins created a whirlwind that even Davenport could be swept up into; Taako crouching down to grin and whisper careful gossip into his ear, Lup loud with winding arms and flitting hands. Lucretia pressed herself to Lup's side, not quite used to being out in front of so many people, but easing herself into quiet laughter at the show they put on. 

But they still hadn't found the light of creation. They still hadn't found it, and Davenport wanted to kick and scream to remind them of their job, their _fucking jobs_ , they had a mission to be on and they were wasting time. He reminded Magnus and Barry of it as they tugged him out, grinning like there wasn't apocalypse every past year of their lives and like there wouldn't be another one this time, coming even sooner and worse if they didn't find what they were looking for. He didn't understand how this didn't consume their lives, how the mission didn't overwhelm them, how they didn't miss _home_ , more than anything, how did they not miss home?

He humored them-he always did-but Davenport kept himself focused. There was nothing that could keep him from this.

But-except-just-

Merle glances up at him and smiles, and Davenport feels his brain shut down.

"Your move, Cap'n," Merle says. It's so easy to relax around him. Terrifyingly so. Davenport glances down and assesses the situation, eyes scanning over each piece carefully. Merle is maybe the only one who is this patient around him as he takes minute to hour to research, to see every detail. It drives Taako insane, the man driving him from the kitchen, threatening mutiny.

"The man doesn't goddamn _improvise_ , there's gotta be a plan, he complains his ass off if there's not, you gotta take some risks, kimosabe!" he'd snapped, flicking water at him. 

"I don't have the time to improvise," Davenport had protested. "I need to make sure it's perfect, it needs to be!"

"I don't have the time to _not_ improvise, my man."

Davenport squints down at the pieces, but he can't focus. He can't focus on anything but Merle's breathing in front of him, deep through his lungs, out through his mouth. He'd asked him if his pipe smoking affected it, and he'd only laughed at the thought, waving his hands. Merle always smelled like smoke, but never in a dirty way. It smelled warm and smoky, like a campfire. Toasted wood. He can almost breathe it in, now, and it's dizzying, and dizzying. 

"Davenport?" Merle says.

He lurches forward, suddenly. Grabbing a pawn and pressing it forward. Like all the gears in his brain have shifted again. Back to function.

"Hey," Merle says. 

Hey. Hey. Hi there.

"Are you alright?" he asks, and the question feels like a test of his patience. Except Davenport could never get angry with him. No matter how much he tries, he just, can't.

"I'm great," he replies, and the words feel like lead on his tongue. He wants to mean them, so bad.

"What's wrong." A statement, not a question.

"The same thing that's always wrong. Jesus, it's always the same thing. We haven't found the light of creation yet, and we've just been sitting around, like we're waiting for it to come find us-"

"Hey, sometimes, that's the only thing we can do." Merle shrugs. "Mango and Barry will probably go out and look for it tomorrow, and we'll hopefully be able to get it then. We're barely a month in, Cap'n, we should be fine."

"But what if we're _not?_ "

Merle moves his queen. "Then we're not."

"I don't-I can't accept that."

"It's a big planet! There's only so much we can do, sometimes, and we still don't know the fate of those who get, you know, gobbled by that big dark blob out there. Who knows? Maybe they're still fighting!"

Davenport jerks forward again, moving another pawn. Making steps while Merle is going leaps and bounds, as always. Fuck.

"I don't get it, Merle. You don't ever seem to stop being so hopeful. Every single planet, every cycle, you just-you're out there, doing everything. Helping the people. Converting. Giving hope, doing all of that, I-I don't know how you stand it."

"Sometimes, you just gotta-go with the flow. Sometimes life just trumps your ass, and you gotta deal with it." He flicks down his pawn. "Checkmate."

Davenport looks up, and he's angry, an old, fifty-year kind of anger that simmers in his bones, and it only intensifies when he sees Merle, sunset and glowing and beautiful. Full of hope and of good and of holiness, of energy, and he loves him, he thinks. He loves Merle and he'd do anything for him, probably, and it rolls over him like a tide, and he knows it's written all over his pathetic face. He doesn't know how to stop it, wishes he could, wishes he could press down these feelings and be overwhelmed by what he's usually overwhelmed by, by apocalypse and fire and fury and the loss of home, but all of his senses are full of beautiful eyes, and campfire smoke, and calloused hands. Davenport thinks he'd never look so beautiful before, except maybe when they had gone camping, and he'd been laughing the whole night with his gut out and his eyes crinkled. He's looking at Merle and wondering and hoping and God. It's too much. It's glowing in his chest.

Davenport shakes his head. "I don't-I can't get out of this."

The man across from him laughs, and he lets it settle in his chest, just this once. "That's a first. You're giving in."

"I'm giving in," he repeats. He's in checkmate.

Davenport doesn't know where he's going, but he knows it's just ahead of him, in this sunrise of a man, in this afterglow of a planet. He reaches across the chess table, and Merle's fingers are as calloused and worn as his face is, and Davenport takes care to tangle them with their own. Merle laughs again, and he lets a smile worm it's way onto his face. Davenport thinks that he's beautiful, and is even more beautiful when his eyes are closed, brushing his other hand against his cheek as he presses against his mouth, smiling, smiling, smiling against this tidal wave.

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr is burnsldes, twitter is @sunshineboiii !


End file.
